APPROACH TO CONSIDER RAPID MANUFACTURING IN THE EARLY PHASES OF PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT
Year: 2015
Editor: Christian Weber, Stephan Husung, Marco Cantamessa, Gaetano Cascini, Dorian Marjanovic, Serena Graziosi
Author: Weiss, Florian; Binz, Hansgeorg; Roth, Daniel
Series: ICED
Institution: University of Stuttgart, Germany
Section: Design for X, Design to X
Page(s): 001-010
ISBN: 978-1-904670-67-4
ISSN: 2220-4334
Abstract
Additive Manufacturing technologies are becoming more and more economical. In some cases due to the possible complexity of geometry they can be competitive to conventional manufacturing. But nowadays, Rapid Manufacturing is mostly not included in the decision for the manufacturing technology because of a lack of knowledge on the part of designers. In order to consider Rapid Manufacturing as an alternative, a step-by-step decision-making process with evolving parameters is proposed in this approach. Here, the consideration of Rapid Manufacturing, as well as Conventional Manufacturing technologies, can be included in the assessment. The proposed step-by-step procedure with hierarchically structured characteristics for the product and the manufacturing processes should ensure that decisions are supported in the early phases of product development as well as in the later phases. By using the suggested procedure, it is possible to take full advantage of the potential of Rapid Manufacturing in the early phases of the product development process. In this stage, the potential can be classified as the highest, because of the high level of design freedom.
Keywords: Early Design Phases, Decision Making, Design Process, Rapid Manufacturing, Additive Manufacturing